A Thorn-torn Soul of Thunder Weeps for the Rain
by Black-Diamonds
Summary: A cruel ice king in an ice castle with an undeniable loneliness, destined to live alone and die alone .... A romance that would never die, in a world that would never bend its perceptions...
1. Power / Passionless Violence

Disclaimer:  
-points a finger at everything you recognise and obviously already realise is not mine- Well guess what? IT'S NOT MINE -insert half-insane cackle-  
**********  
  
"I was never faithful  
And I was never one to trust  
Borderlining schizo  
And guaranteed to cause a fuss"  
-"Black Eyed" by Placebo  
  
**********  
  
¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯* ~~~~~~~  
  
  
An evil grin flitted on the lips of the tall figure cloaked in black. From his patent black shoes  
to the silvery blonde hair which framed his face, he was a picture of perfection...had it not  
been for his cold, cruel heart, which was as dark as a moonless night. The stars outside the  
castle appeared to tremble with fear.  
*  
"Voldemort, do you fear me?" Draco Malfoy sneered. Riddle said nothing, but bowed lower,  
until his head was touching the floor.  
"Answer me!" Draco yelled. "Answer me or you will suffer a fate worse than death!"  
"I do not dare defy you, Malfoy. You have proved you are far greater than I."  
"The Great Dark Lord, quivering at my feet." Draco smiled maliciously. "Ah, a sight which  
has come none too soon. Tell me, oh great one," a spiteful leer appears across his face, "Am  
I not the most powerful?"  
"No." A low gravelly whisper. "You are not."  
"YOU LIE!" Draco screamed, his face flushed with rage. "You lie and tell me what you know  
is not true. Well then, oh most wise and fearful Voldemort, who is, in your most lowly opinion,  
the most powerful."  
"Harry Potter your greatness."  
A blinding flash and a painful final scream and he was gone.  
"I never liked you much anyway." Draco looked at his reflection in a mirror on the wall and  
smiled. The boy/man in the mirror smiled back. He liked how he looked.  
"Good job sir..." The mirror cooed. "If I may say so, you certainly look strapping in  
that...cloak."  
"Shut up Roger."  
"Certainly sir...Goodnight then."  
Draco turned sharply and went back to his immensely large bedroom. 


	2. Untitled Gift / ?

"I have a present for you oh most evil one!" Pansy Parkinson sauntered into the dining room, barely containing her excitement.  
  
"Shut up Pansy." Pale slender fingers curled around the coffee mug before him.  
  
"Oh, but you'll like my gift."  
  
"Sod off!"  
  
"Don't you even want to see it?"  
  
"Not if it's as ugly as you are." Draco really did not like the woman standing before him. Everything about her was fake. Of course, it didn't appear that way to the others. To them, she was an ideal match for Draco, a bad girl to the core. To Draco, she could have been part of the furniture for all he cared.  
  
"Really, Dray, be nice now. Teapooooooooot!" She screamed out to the house elf of the manor. "Get Master Draco's present!"  
  
The little frightened elf appeared at the doorway.  
  
"Teapot try to Mistress, but present refuse to come with Teapot." Teapot twisted his ears this way and that, his sad miserable eyes not daring to look at Pansy.  
  
"Well then, stupid, make her come! Or do I have to throw you into the thorn bush again?"  
  
On the verge of tears, Teapot nodded and hurried away. A few moments later, he reappeared, a hooded figure in tow. Pansy grinned gleefully.  
  
"Ah, there we are now. Well Draco, don't you like it?"  
  
"I'm not an it you freak! I'm a person!" The figure screamed angrily, straining in desperation against the chains that bound her hands and feet.  
  
"Shut up slave!" Pansy snarled. "Now bow before the Lord of Darkness!" But Draco was far from interested in what Pansy was saying. His eyes were fixed on the girl in chains, whose hood had fallen away in the struggle.  
  
"Hermione Granger..." He whispered, almost to himself. But then, realising the situation, he straightened up, and put on an expression of loathing. "Welcome to your new home mudblood. Chores will start this afternoon. You'll begin by polishing the shoes in the master bedroom, and then you will join the others in the laundry. Try not to contaminate my belongings with your mudblood germs."  
  
Pansy grinned devilishly and draped her arms around Draco's shoulders. This was the man she loved to see him be.  
  
*  
  
That evening Pansy stormed into the living room in a fit of rage, a blur of dark hair and dark purple robes.  
  
"She refuses to do her chores, the little rat!"  
  
Draco looked up lazily at her.  
  
"What's the problem now?"  
  
She stared at him angrily.  
  
"The little mudblood I bought is refusing to do her chores! Honestly, who does she think she is?! First she refuses to bow to you and now she won't clean the dungeon! Maybe she needs a good thrashing." Pansy slammed herself into a velvet armchair and began cursing about disobedient slaves and filthy mudbloods.  
  
"I'll go see her then shall I?"  
  
Pansy sneered.  
  
"Why would you want to do that?"  
  
"I think she needs to be taught a lesson." 


	3. Plagued by a vision

Draco stalked through the halls of the manor until he reached the dungeons. Pausing outside the heavy door,  
he smirked darkly to himself, before entering the dim, cold room.  
"Well, mudblood, not behaving ourselves are we?"  
*  
Hermione screamed out in anger as Draco slammed her against the wall, forcefully folding her wrists above her head. His eyes were filled with a strange burning fury.  
"How dare you defy me! You are a slave now, and you will obey my orders!"  
Hermione stared back at him in fury.  
"And if I do not?"  
Draco lowered his face until it was an inch away from her's.  
"Then, I will kill you." He brushed his lips over her's. "And then I'll kill your family." One last intense look and he was gone. Hermione slid down the wall and curled up, humiliated, angry, and confused.  
*  
Draco twisted and turned in bed, his dreams plagued by images of a girl with long brown hair cascading around her shoulders like silk. Her eyes were filled with pain, and her sorrowful gaze burned searing holes on the backs of his eyelids. At that moment Draco would have done anything to ease her sadness. The girl started crying, long racking sobs that made her body shake with emotion. Draco's eyes snapped open, with the realisation that the crying wasn't just in his imagination. 


	4. Strangenesses / Black rose petals

By the time Draco arrived in the servants' quarters, Hermione had fallen asleep from her  
previous yelling and crying. Her face pale and gaunt and her breath shallow, she lay on her  
side in a corner, sleeping at least somewhat peacefully. Draco reached out and gently traced  
the outline of her jaw, and then suddenly drew his hand back as though he'd touched  
something forbidden.  
"Damn it..." he muttered. For what seemed like hours he sat there watching Hermione sleep,  
half-convincing himself that she was nothing more than a 'filthy mudblood'. Finally, with a  
sigh, he got up and left. As his heavy footsteps faded away, Hermione cautiously opened her  
eyes. Oh gods, she thought, what in Merlin's name is going on?  
*  
Early the next morning, Draco looked at his appearance in the mirror by his lavishly  
decorated bed.  
"Morning Lordship." Yawned the mirror.  
"Shut up and tell me how I look."  
"Dashing as always. The black of your clothes really brings out your...eyes. So nicely steely  
they are, and er..."  
Draco grinned at his reflection and ran a hand through his silky ice blonde hair.  
"I know I'm gorgeous, you don't have to tell me." He chuckled and walked towards the door.  
"And yet so arrogant." The mirror muttered half-heartedly. Unfortunately Draco heard.  
Calmly, his hand reached for an very expensive and very heavy metal and glass ornament  
nearby. Like a viper striking, Draco hurled it at the mirror. With a tinkle and a high-pitched  
scream, the mirror shattered, and shards of glass fell to the floor."  
"Mirror mirror on the wall, shame you had to take a fall." Draco laughed idiotically at his own  
joke. He shook his head, resumed a grim and hateful expression, and left for the main hall.  
*  
"Damn it." Hermione muttered, wincing as the knife blade nicked her finger. Living like a  
muggle was one thing. Peeling potatoes as a slave for the Dark Lord was another. Especially  
when the Dark Lord was Draco Malfoy, and he was playing mind games with you. Hermione  
closed her eyes, and saw his face clearly, like it was imprinted at the back of her mind.  
Scowling, she returned to the boring task before her.  
"Thinking of me are we Princess?" Malfoy's voice sounded like frozen poisonous honey,  
dripping with an artificial sweetness but filled with a genuine venomous sarcasm.  
"Not likely." Not bothering to be at all polite or menial, she roughly threw a potato into the  
metal bucket and kept peeling. She found herself then looking at a black rose he held up in  
front of her.  
"Poor suicidal Hermione. Really, you don't have to be so vicious. I've brought a little present  
for you." He looked pointedly at the rose. The way he'd said her name made her blood turn  
cold.  
"I don't want anything from you." She glared back with an intense anger.  
"Oh really..." He smirked, almost tenderly taking her hand in his. Bringing it up to his lips, he  
kissed her pale knuckles with a seeming gentleness. "Take it." He whispered, placing the  
flower in her hand. Hermione drew in a ragged breath, now completely unsure of the  
situation. Suddenly, Draco had quickly dragged the rose's stem across the skin of her palm.  
With a pained gasp, Hermione realised a sharp thorn on the stem had cut deeply into her  
flesh. Draco grinned slightly, a strange glint in his eye, as a small line of blood appeared  
across Hermione's cut. Leaving her to the pain, Draco quickly strided away from her, pausing  
at the door.  
"Have a nice day...Hermione." 


	5. Smashed Melancholy

Hermione wanted to throttle him. Her anger rattled inside her like a dancing fire inside a cage. She wanted to smack that mocking cheshire-cat grin off his face, wanted to scream  
insults at him until her throat was raw. She hated the way he toyed with her emotions, and made her feel like the prey of some sleek wild jungle cat. She hated him. And now she could  
hear him in the room above the kitchens.  
"When my baby smiles at me I go to Rio....De Janiero..." His voice seemed to further mock her, dare her to feel hate and pain and love and anything of nothing. She wanted to burn the  
whole place down, make him feel her pain, taste the bitter truth of life. The rose that he had hurt her with lay on the floor, looking deceivingly innocent. The charm he had used on it had worn off, and it was no longer black, but had pure white petals, tainted by tiny droplets of blood.  
"Shades of grey, blur my reality..." His voice rang clearly, and it seemed like he was interpretting her very thoughts into song. The whole thing had Hermione more than confused.  
She felt helpless, isolated, scared, furious...insane with a mad urge to claw her way back to a safe place, where everything was sugar-coated like candy almonds. He continued to cut  
through the silence with random muggle songs, often pausing to laugh and smash a few things. It wasn't what he'd done to her that scared Hermione. It was his wild and strange  
behaviour. It was the tinkles of glass on glass or the clangs of metal on everything else. Shades of grey began to swim in front of Hermione's eyes. The air in the kitchens, which  
very noticeably stunk of onions and meat, began to smell like that of a tomb, a crypt. Hermione wanted out of this grey-on-grey chaos, and she wanted it now.  
*  
a/n: sorry this chapter was this short. i wanted to make it snappy and powerful, instead of  
long and drifty if you get what i'm saying. i used someone else's song for that whole Rio thing, but the lyrics of the other one(shades of grey) come from my imagination(as far as i am aware of there is no song with those lyrics) 


	6. Flowers Don't Bite / Oddnesses

a/n: rewinding a bit to the last 2 chapters - sorry if i've confused anyone. chapter 4 was meant to show how unpredictable and cruel draco can be(with the mirror and the rose). i've left it open as to what draco's feelings towards hermione are and vice versa(for now, you can make up your own minds, but later on i'll steer them in some direction). the black rose is the lead-up to chapter 5. often things in life aren't clearly defined, such as emotions. sometimes there is no clear way to draw the line between hate and love, and this is where the shades of grey thing comes into relevance. the rose is a sort of lead up because of the way it changes back from black to white, and the fact that it was white to start off with. chapter 5 also shows how emotionally and mentally unstable draco is. he's gone on a total power trip, and it's kind of gone to his head(that's why he's singing and smashing things). gracias amigos for reviewing the story. your support is fantastic. i honestly didn't think many people would read this story or review it. feel free to tell me when you're not quite clear on something or if there's a mistake in the story.  
*  
"I don't know why you insist on giving the slaves breaks. They're slaves, they should be grateful they get anything from us at all." Sultry, annoyed Pansy lay herself out on a black velvet lounge, biting down sulkily on her lip. Her hand held a metal goblet containing some strong dark red alcohol. She swirled it around before gulping some of it.  
"Don't give yourself a nosebleed." Draco looked out of the rain-spattered windows and on to  
the garden, where a figure in a white shift was walking about almost aimlessly. "I don't think  
walking in the middle of a storm is much of a break."  
"What are you, the Slave Liberation Army or something?" Pansy cried, trowing her goblet  
across the room. "You. are. the. DARK LORD. You have ultimate power over everyone."  
"No shit sherlock. Power over everyone. That includes you. So sod off retard."  
Pansy got up and narrowed her eyes at Draco.  
"You don't scare me." She placed a kiss that reeked of wine on his lips. "Dragon." She left, kicking the house elf that stood at the doorway. The elf immediately began banging his head  
on the frame of the door. Draco rolled his eyes and started singing softly to himself.  
"No-one loves me, every bo-dy hates me-ee I think I'll go eaaaat worms."  
Another glance out the window showed him Hermione flicking water over the edge of the pond with bare toes. Fastening his heavy black cloak, Draco exited the manor by the long  
cold stone staircase and went down to the garden.  
"She sells sea-shells by the sea-shore..." He plucked a blossom from an obliging plant, and strode purposefully over to Hermione. Draco reached out and placed a hand on her back.  
She recoiled from his touch, almost falling into the dim waters of the pond. Remembering the last time she'd seen him with a flower in hand, Hermione moved away from him.  
"Don't be scared. Flowers don't bite." He whispered, his breath creating little puffs of whiteness in the cold air. He twirled the soft blue flower in his fingers, before lifting it up in a gesture that could have either been him breathing in its honey-like scent or him brushing the dew-drop petals with his lips. From lowered eyelids he looked up at her, almost with a kitten-like innocence. Hermione felt a strange sickness in her stomach. It was the result of either not having enough to eat or the way he looked at her or the fact that it was HIM in general. In a surprisingly gentle manner, he held out the flower to her. She eyed it with a weary caution. No thorns. The stem was smooth and green. Hermione found herself reaching out and taking it. Once she held it in her own hand, Draco looked at her once more with his glacial-blue eyes, a smile tugging at the corners of his perfectly shaped pale pink lips, before walking off towards the woods beyond the garden. 


	7. Dream Sequence

Several times each night, Draco was woken up by violent dreams. Dreams that reeked of  
death and destruction, that were filled with tortured screams and dying people. And then,  
within the carnage of his dreams one night, there she was. She was simply standing there,  
holding a silver rose out to him. In his sleep, Draco smiled openly. Everything would be good.  
He'd get rid of that blockhead Pansy, and he would make Hermione his Queen of Diamonds.  
They'd rule eternity with a golden-hand of foreverness.  
In his dream, Draco extended his hand towards her. Hermione gently shook her head, her  
chocolate brown tendrils flying around her face as if a sudden breeze had swept through.  
She silently walked towards him, her lips pursed together with an innocent smile. Light  
glinted off the silver rose in her hand. When she reached him, Draco's arms circled her waist  
and pulled her in to embrace her. That was when he realised she wasn't holding a rose. It  
was nothing like a rose. It was a dagger. Hermione gleefully laughed, finally breaking the  
silence. She looked from the dagger to him and back, battering her eyelashes sweetly like a  
little schoolgirl. Oh, but schoolgirls don't carry big bad daggers. Hermione looked him in the  
eye. And then she winked.  
Draco awoke with a scream, sweat dripping down his face. With one silken sleeve of his  
pyjamas, Draco wiped his face, and then untangled himself from the black silk sheets that  
were twisted around him. With a groan, he climbed out of bed, and his feet hunted around on  
the floor for his slippers. As he placed his feet in their warm, soft comfort, Draco looked down  
and snickered to himself. If only the world knew that the Dark Lord had fuzzy pink bunny  
slippers. 


	8. Chained / Beautiful Distraction

a/n: ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls: THANKY.U 4 THE REVIEWS! a billion thankyou's to all of you! may your crayons always be bright and your ice cream forever frozen(woah, personal note: need to lay off coffee before coming online). to clear up a few things; pansy and drac aren't married, they're just sort of a couple and they live together in the manor. well, more like she attatches herself to him, but u get my drift. glad you peoplez like drac's slippers;)  
*  
"What!?" Hermione screamed as he snapped the clamp around her wrist with a metallic click. It was the next afternoon, and she found herself chained to an intricate metal lattice.  
"I don't trust you." He snarled viciously, eyeing her with suspicion. "You tried to kill me."  
"You're insane! I haven't even seen you for a week!"   
Not answering to her, he summoned a pile of black clothes. They were made of silk and velvet. Bits of green ribbon sparkled in the dim light.  
"You'll wear these. And from now on, you're not leaving my sight."  
"How can I dress myself if I'm handcuffed to a metal frame!?"  
"Use magic. Or have you forgotten how to in all your plotting to kill me? I'll be back in a moment...be ready by then."  
*  
Ten minutes later Hermione found herself sitting beside him, her right hand holding a plate of wild strawberries and dark chocolate-coated almonds. Hermione kept having to bite her tongue to keep from cursing every time she looked down and saw the black silk corset laced together with serpent-green ribbon, and the long black velvet skirt. It made her look like she really was part of this freak-show. The smell of dark rich chocolate made her head swim, and the way Draco kept blowing kisses her way made her stomach turn. Draco reached for another strawberry. He was about to place it in his mouth but paused. He held it in front of Hermione's lips. She refused to acknowledge him, keeping her lips firmly pressed shut.  
"Oh come on. Cheer up. It could be worse you know. I could have chained you to thatfruit-cake Pansy. Now come on." He waved the strawberry in front of her, so she could smell its wild fruity scent. Hermione turned her face away briskly, her hair whipping about her.  
"Tut-tut." Draco scolded, pulling on her chain so that the metal cut into her wrist. Not willing to see the extent he would go to, Hermione turned back towards him.  
"That's better." Draco smiled at her, before trailing feathery butterfly kisses along her neck. Hermione felt the world tip beneath her feet, the room and all its blackness swirl. She bit down hard on her lip as he swept her hair back over her shoulder and kissed the smooth line of her jaw. So hard in fact, that she drew blood. As the coppery taste filled her mouth, Hermione felt Draco's lips of velvet ice upon her own. He kissed her, his mist blonde strands of hair falling over her face.  
"I, uh..." Hermione began. But she was quickly cut off by another of Draco's chocolaty kisses. After a few moments, she pulled away.  
"I should go now."  
Draco ran a pale finger up her arm and then on to the chain.  
"How? You're kind of attached to a heavy metal frame-work in case you didn't notice. But-" He continued, noticing her alarm. "If you're good...I'll..." He leaned in again, his breath tickling her ear. "I'll let you go."  
With a satisfying click, Hermione heard the sound of her freedom from the chains. Rubbing her sore wrists, she looked up at him.  
"Thankyou...Draco."  
"Do not address me so informally." He narrowed his eyes. "I may have given you the liberty of being free from these damn chains. But do not tempt me to take further action to make sure you behave in the proper fashion." He snapped.  
"Of course Lordship." She dropped to her knees and bowed.  
"Look at me."  
From her kneeling position, Hermione dared to look up at him through lowered eyelids.  
"Would you like something to drink...Hermione?" He seemed to struggle with the words, almost as if he was weighed down with guilt at the things he had done to her. He slowly reached out a hand to her. Hermione nodded slightly as she cautiously took his hand, afraid that at any moment Draco might burst into wild song or smash a few more windows or slash her with a metal object. But he did none of these things. Instead, he calmly called out to a house elf to bring them drinks. After a little house elf appeared with a jug and two goblets, Draco poured her a drink, never taking his eyes off her. Hermione accepted the drink and looked at it. What she saw made her slightly queasy.  
"Is this um...blood?" She caught sight of her own startled reflection in the dark red liquid.  
Draco laughed loudly.  
"It's nectar syrup you ninny. Just because I'm the Dark Lord doesn't mean I go around drinking blood. Ugh, I'll leave that one to the vampires thankyou very much."  
"You...you scare me." Hermione admitted, lowering her eyes to the floor.  
Draco's hand lashed out and grasped her wrist.  
"Oh...how so?"  
Hermione laughed nervously.  
"You're the um...Dark Lord." She said, stressing on how obvious it was.  
"Does this scare you?" He gently kissed her.  
"No..." Hermione pulled away and looked at him. "Why..." Her incomplete question hung in the air. Enchanted stars like sugar drops sparkled in the dim light of the room. Draco felt his eyes misting with the familiar feel of warm tears. Draco hastily wiped at his eyes. For a dragon must not cry, especially a dragon with eyes of stone. Hermione however, felt a lump in her throat as she saw this. Her heart twisted in way of several different emotions. This was the man who had taken thousands of lives. She didn't even know if her friends were dead or not. This man was keeping her here as his prisoner, to serve, honour and obey, much like an animal. This man was a mystery, shrouded is a mist filled with hate and love and good and bad. She'd thought she'd known him in school. Draco Malfoy; annoying, pompous, spoiled, rude, uncouth and bad to the very core.  
But standing before him, she saw a tortured soul, a broken down boy, lost in his own  
bitterness.  
Instinctively, Hermione put her cup down and took his hand in her's. Draco jerked his hand away, a pink blush tinging his pale cheeks.  
"I don't need your sympathy...mudblood. "  
"But maybe I need your's...Draco." And with that she turned and ran out of the room, leaving  
behind a completely confounded Draco. 


	9. Soul Far Gone / Glorious Betrayal

A cracked wall-length mirror reflected her startled self back at her, skin pale and ashen against clothes black as night. Footsteps told her that he had followed her. She didn't turn around, and wasn't surprised to see that he didn't have a reflection. After all, becoming Dark Lord must have meant he'd given his soul to the dark side completely.  
"My Lord..." A hint of bitter sarcasm touched her words, and her eyes were cold and distant.  
"Hermione. I uh..."  
"You what? Want me to clean your shoes? Scrub the bathroom until the floors shine like stars?"  
An awkward silence so thick it could be punctured by butterfly wings filled the distance between them.  
Finally, Hermione broke the silence.  
"So what DO you want?"  
"Accio seats." He summoned two plush velvet chairs. "Just to talk..." He sat down. "Nothing more."  
"I see we haven't brought any little gifts." She smirked.  
"Don't push me you little brat. I'm trying to be nice." His wand was pointed at her, tiny dangerous blue sparks shooting into the darkness like perriwinkle fireworks.  
"Or what...you'll blow me into oblivion in a trillion little bits? Well," She said with a startling emptiness,  
"Go on then. Try it. Use your kazaam and pow on me. Will it fill the gaping void in your already lost soul if you do that? Soul, hah," She laughed in an acidic sort of way and leaned towards him. "Lest you have one Draco Malfoy. Lest you still have one."  
The words hit him like a frosted lashing whip, and for a moment, the walls of solid stone and ice around him seemed to fall, like a smashed lego castle. But the walls came back, and he seemed to almost suck in his pain and torment, as if he himself were a black hole of nothingness.  
"What do you know anything about me? Huh? You think you know so much. Even in Hogwarts, you had to be the brightest flame. Always...so intelligent, so lively...so much of everything I could never be. You hadn't the faintest idea of what was underneath everything that was me and you still don't."  
Hermione sucked in a breath, her curiosity stirred as if it had been hit by some charm or spell.  
"Do you want to actually tell me about your Jerry Springer-esque life? Or would that mean you'd have to kill me afterwards?"  
"Who's Jerry Springer??"  
"Muggle TV guy..." Hermione muttered. "Now spill the beans, or I'm calling Oprah."  
So Draco spilled, pouring out the secrets from all the dark nooks and corners of his hopelessly lost life. Hermione listened quietly, her eyes not quite meeting his, but filled with compassion and understanding.  
"You've had a pretty lousy life."  
He narrowed his eyes, ashamed and half-annoyed at himself for having told this...servant, things he'd never ever told anyone else.  
"Well at least my parents don't clean other peoples' teeth!"  
"Didn't."  
"Didn't what?"  
"That whole thing you said about my parents should be in the past tense. They're dead now." She whispered, with a deathly coldness. "They died when YOUR people went on that mad muggle-massacre. And at least my parents didn't force me to commit my life to killing innocent people!"  
"I'm sorry."  
She sneered, her pity for him turning into anger and hatred.  
"Sorry? You're SORRY? Oh that's a laugh. You don't have the heart to feel SORRY about anything."  
"I...I am." He said, almost wistfully. His expression hardened. "You tell anyone anything about what I have said here tonight and I'll-"  
"You'll kill me or blow me up or something." Hermione rolled her eyes. "It's getting old." She gasped as she felt something cold and metal dig against the soft flesh of her neck.  
"Don't tempt me." He leaned in and whispered, his voice low and threatening, like a rumble of distant thunder. Swallowing hard, Hermione kept her eyes away from him. His smooth voice started singing in her ear.  
"Time...is on my side...yes it is..."  
She ignored the smooth sound of his singing, and instead concentrated on the feel of ice-cold silver on her neck.  
"Why the choice of weapon? Where's your wand?"  
Silence.  
A clatter followed as he threw the jade-handled knife on to the stone floor. Unsure and not-completely-in-control of the situation, Draco turned to leave.  
"You wouldn't have done it. You can't."  
Startled at the amazing clarity and frankness in her voice, he whipped around and looked at her.  
"What makes you think...that."  
"Because I'm still standing here, saying these words to you." She closed the distance between them.  
Standing on tip-toes, Hermione gently kissed him.  
A shock wave passed through them both. Hermione, who seemed to finally realise what she'd done, pulled away from him, half-horrified. Draco gaped at her, and then sneered cruelly. Hermione's heart ached at his reaction. Not waiting for him to say anything, she turned and fled from the room. 


	10. Emotional Surrender / Rain-Dissolved Tru...

Every rain-soaked day brings drama to our lives. The dull greys and splatters of ice-cold hail stir something in our souls. Rain seems to drive our inner-most emotions and push back the surface of the facades we put on. Every window holds a secret, yet reveals one too.  
Draco stood at a window, peering out from inside dark curtains. Again, it was raining, the sky a menacing bruised greyish-blue-black. And she was out there again. The rain seemed to call out to her, seemed to beckon her to come outside. He watched her lithe form, shoulders slumped, clothes soaked thoroughly. Draco watched her approach an apple-tree, her fingers reach out and grasp a plump red apple from a low branch. She raised the fruit to her lips, and raised her eyes up to his in the window. A look that clearly said I-know-you-were-looking-at-me appeared on her face, and her pale soft lips curled into what could have been a smile or a smirk.  
"You love her don't you?" A low voice almost growled from behind him. "You're growing weak, you pathetic love-struck boy."  
"Be quiet Severus...what do you know of love?"  
Draco whirled around to face his old potions master, now a faithful advisor to him.  
"Enough to know that look on your face."  
"What look?  
Snape didn't answer him, instead picking up a book from the desk, his long pale fingers fiddling with the latch on the book.  
"I asked you what look you are talking about. I don't have any feelings for that...mudblood." Draco spat out, his eyes avoiding Snape's.  
"She intrigues you...you want to call her your own. I'm not stupid boy, I can tell obsession from hate. Mudblood or not, she IS what you want."  
"You're a useless old fool. I don't know why I listened to you through all those boring potions lessons."  
Draco became fidgety, and played with his pearly white finger nails. "You bore me."  
"Without me, you wouldn't be where you are today."  
"Shut up!" Draco hurled a violent curse at him, causing Snape to wince in pain as the bones in his left foot gave way with a sickening crack. Draco smiled, perfect white teeth against pale pink flesh.  
"Aint no satisfaction..."  
With what dignity he had left, Snape turned sharply, sending his long black cape flying around him like a blanket of darkness, and limped out of the room. Draco cautiously turned his eyes back to the window, his singing fading away. She was once again playing at the edge of the water, soaked with rain. She moved almost casually to a rock on the side of the rain-drop-dimpled pond. Turning her face gently towards the sky, she smiled, just once...  
Realisation and truth come in lightning-like flashes.  
Draco suddenly knew what Hermione intended to do.  
As he opened his mouth to cry out, Hermione had simply given herself to the cold dark waters of the pond, her hair fanning out around her face like billowing silk. In a single moment, a terrible aching filled him. All magic forgotten, no difference between hate and love, Draco tore himself away from the window and dashed out of the room. Down flights of silent lonely stairs, his feet pounded heavily against the stone floor. He reached the pond, his heart thumping furiously inside his chest. Her body was gone from view, sunken below the water.Draco pulled off the heavy woolen cloak from around his shoulders, but didn't bother with his expensive black leather shoes. He dived into the water, struggling to push through the reeds and pond flowers. A pale form suddenly came up in front of her. A ghost-like figure surrounded by funeral-black clothes.  
His Hermione.  
The sudden thought of HER as HIS didn't even surprise him. Nothing rarely surprised him any more.  
His arms reached out and took a firm hold of her lifeless frame. Within moments that seemed to span like forevers, he had pulled her above the surface, he himself struggling to give necessary oxygen to his lungs. As he gently placed her on the frosty green grass beside the pond, he noticed her lips were blue, and her hands strangely colourless. He had seen dead bodies. A lot of them. Enough to know that Hermione was probably moments away from death's door. His long slender fingers gently felt for a pulse along her cold limp wrist. He found one, but it was barely there, like a dying butterfly. Her flame was slowly burning out. Draco wanted to smash his head on something hard. He could kill in a thousand different ways, but could not save lives. For all the lives he had taken, he'd gladly give his to see Hermione live. Not wanting to give up, he vainly tried to revive her. He covered her with the cloak he'd taken off earlier, and tried even muggle methods of reviving people who'd come close to drowning. Nothing seemed to work. A heavy hand came down on his shoulder.  
"I loved a girl once..." Snape; wistful, brooding, tragic poet and psychotically biased ex-potions  
professor. "She didn't love me back though. Women...such useless beautiful creatures."  
"Shut up and help me you troll!" Draco glared up at Snape. "You think you could stop being a drama-queen and actually help me wake her up?!"  
"And why DO you want her to LIVE...Draco, Mr. Dark Lord?" Snape's voice was noxious yet lilting. "I thought you had all the powers in the world."  
"I don't have one power." Draco eyes looked back to Hermione's face, and his hand held tightly on to her's. "I don't have the power of love."  
"Tragic. Don't think about breaking out into Celine Dion or I'll have to tell everyone what a snuggle-bunny the Great and Powerful Draco Malfoy is."  
"Shut up and help me!"  
Snape sighed.  
"I will, only so you don't hurt my ears with your not so Great and Powerful vocals." 


	11. Gentle Slumber / Waking Moments

Drifts of consciousness...  
  
"Will she be all right?"  
"Calm yourself. Yes, she will."  
"But she's been asleep so long..."  
A light appeared, bright and silvery. What was it they said in all those books? The light at the end of the tunnel. Maybe this was what dying was. A hand taking a light grip on her's pulled her back to the world of the living. The light shifted from a heaven-like radiance into a halo of spun silver framing a sharp pale face. Was it a dream or reality? Her head felt light like it was filled with helium, yet heavy like it was still below water. Water...wait. Didn't she...or did she?  
A vague memory of being enveloped by liquid darkness...  
*  
She awoke in a room filled with the cloying scent of musk and cinnamon. Feeling secure and safe, her fingers felt thick blankets wrapping her in their warmth. Candles flickered and shadows danced on the walls. A voice beyond the glow of the candles...  
"Did you sleep well princess?" A voice warm and rich, like molasses, soothing like a summer breeze. Such a change from its usual bitter frostiness.  
Hermione gently rubbed her sore eyes and looked up at him. This was real, no longer a dream. A few blinks and the image cleared up, and everything changed from blurred edges into smooth shapes.  
"Get away from me Malfoy."   
Draco was shocked at her sudden behaviour. She glared at him.  
"Are you some kind of unbalanced psychotic pervert? Watching me sleep...how could you be so sick?! I mean, I know you're Malfoy and you're sick, but HOW COULD YOU SINK SO LOW!?"  
His hand lashed out and slapped her, causing her to cry out at the sudden sharp pain across her cheek. Her hand reached up and soothed the stinging, her eyes filling with hot tears.  
"I saved your life you ungrateful little..." The sentence remained unfinished. Ashamed of his sudden violent behaviour, he gently stroked her cheek. "I'm sorry Hermione."  
A further shock. She didn't pull away from him, and instead fixed her eyes on his own stone blue ones. He continued, not moving his hand away.  
"Why did you do it? Is it because you're unhappy?"  
"Ten points to the idiot for that answer." She whispered. "Of course I'm not unhappy. I'm as happy as can be. I just love being here. Dear diary, I love my life as an obedient yes-girl to Draco Malfoy. My life resembles that of a pet dog but it's all good. Now, what do you think?" She tilted her head and looked up towards him, eyes filled with a dozen emotions.  
He removed his hand and turned away, though he didn't answer her question.  
"You've been asleep, almost half-dead, for over a week. Snape...he uh, he helped me keep you alive."  
"And weren't you glad I was half way there? Saved you your trouble...saved everyone's. Why did you..." Her voice was soft, like liquid gold. "Why did you even bother to save me?"  
"Because I can not live without you." His voice cracked with emotion as he turned back to face her. "I can not live without my soul." A single crystal tear slid down his cheek. "Even though I don't deserve you." 


	12. Running Scared Cold Alone

He cleared his throat and straightened himself up. "I should let you get some rest. It may be that I can't live without you, for some unknown reason that's etched into fate and destiny...but I do not, in any way, have room for you in my heart. You still remain what you have always been there."  
"Draco Malfoy." She called out, sitting up on the bed. "I know...that you're not telling the truth. I know that you don't hate me."  
"How so? How can you presume something like that? Love is like spun-glass, it can break at any time...how can you say..."  
"Every chance you have had to kill me, you haven't. You've simply let me live. You told me that if I didn't do what I was told, you would kill me and my family. My family are already dead, but I am still alive at the mercy of your hand. Even when I tried to take my own worthless life, you saved me. And even now, Draco, I mentioned nothing of love. It was you, who did that."  
"Love is for the weak and fickle. Shallow men are willing to give their hearts to frivolous women, only to have them torn apart. I don't think love is part of me, nor do I wish for it to be. It's just another wretched barrier we put up against the slings and arrows of life. It's a pointless illusion...it dilutes our true perceptions of reality."  
"Stop trying to fool yourself. Obsession, hate, love...what difference does it make? Live a little, Draco."  
He glared at her, but somehow, his glare didn't have the same venom any more. It lacked, and seemed hollow now, almost like it was a mask he slipped on.  
"Stop lecturing me, you filthy-"  
"Filthy what? Huh? Go ahead, yell some stupid name at me. You save my life and then you freak out because for once you've felt another emotion apart from senseless hatred. Well let me tell you something Draco Malfoy. You aren't the ice-king you think you are. You're the Dark Lord, no denying that. But you turn away from emotion. Every time you come close to feeling anything, you pull those walls of ice up around you again and deny the very things that make you human. But those feelings are still there, whether you have a soul or not. You may turn away from me...but you can't turn away from yourself."  
He had lost control of the situation. Like a dew drop that trickled off the gentle edge of a flower petal, it had simply fallen away from him. He turned. She was watching him, her eyes following his every move. Her eyes were holding something. What? Contempt? Care? Concern? Dare he even think it, love??  
He left, not wanting to, yet feeling vague of everything and needing to.  
He ran, almost feeling her angelic presence beside him through the stony darknesses and down the endless stairs of night. His breathing was erratic and frantic.  
He felt ashamed. Dark Lord Draco Malfoy; Scared, frightened, alone, ashamed...shattered. It was like the voices of his victims had come to haunt him. He himself was spun-glass and crystal and ice and sugar. He had been shattered. Seeming perfect porcelain...flawed and tainted.He didn't want to feel anything. Being numb was all that there was. It kept him where he was, on a high pedastal away from everyone and everything. Up here in the bitter cold, he couldn't be touched. A greasy thick voice beside his ear.  
"If you love something let it go..."  
Draco turned and looked at the form of Severus Snape.  
"And if she does not return?"  
"Then she was never your's in the first place."  
  
*  
a/n: thank.u so much to every1 who has reviewed...your response has been so positive and it's so encouraging to me. It really inspires me, knowing that there are people out there like you guys that are willing to read and give such good feedback. 


	13. Poisonous Blackmail

Draco hurt inside. He wanted to punch all the windows in the manor bare-fisted until blood dripped down his knuckles. Love, love, L-O-V-E. So innocently sweet, yet so devouring...blood, drips like a crimson rain; pooling blood...He'd subconsciously put his fist through a glass-front cabinet of meaninglessly expensive china plates. It might have been his personal little pain trip moments ago, but in reality, he winced from the sting of having tiny glass fragments lodged in his hand.  
Snape watched the Dark Lord fight his own inner demons and smiled semi-sardonically to himself.  
Women. Damn them. So beautiful and divine yet so bloody...bloody what? He couldn't even finish his own sentence. They were like vampires and damsels at the same time. They could send a distress call straight to your heart and then leave you feeling much like a pile of dung. Memories from all those years ago...  
Snape retreated back to his own personal santuary of photographs and Barbara Streisand muggle records.  
*  
Pansy Parkinson was not one of these vampires or damsels. She was an empty shell of a person.  
Pansy simply didn't have inner-emotions. Not because she'd had them taken from her through a broken-heart or a dementor's kiss, but because they merely didn't exist within her. She liked to flaunt her expensive clothes(muggle and wizard made) around the manor, verbally abusing a house-elf or two on the way. She liked to drape herself all over Draco, and spend his galleons. Pansy went for the physical beauty. She never bothered to connect to Draco on any other level. Plumping up some throw pillows in the drawing room, she waited for Draco that evening, like a spider awaiting the fly.  
He entered, his face stormy like a thunder cloud. Pansy seemed happier than usual, her makeup; excessive, her attitude; too strange. Yet her words were...direct to the point.  
"I know about your little midnight excursions...and I know that these times are not used for obedience lessons with the mudblood."  
"If you don't like it, you're most welcome to leave. I shall be informing Hermione that she can have your room and clothes." Pansy's face could not look worse if it had been hit by a hex. Draco continued.  
"That's right. Leave. Leave tonight. But do not think about taking everything you have bought with my money."  
"I'm the one in control here, so listen up Malfoy. I'm telling you now...you better go out beyond the poppy fields tomorrow and kill that little bitch, otherwise," She paused, pursing her dark full lips together, "I'll owl the Daily Prophet and tell them what a moron the Dark Lord is. I'll give them details of where this swinging little manor is, and I'll have you banished faster than you can say kapow."  
Draco glared at Pansy.  
"They won't be able to find this place...they won't even be able to detect it. Don't you think I would have made this place child and idiot-proof already?"  
Pansy snorted, a sound like a cross between a pig and frog, and tossed the pillow from her hands over her shoulder.  
"Wrong, pea-brain. I know all the spells that take your wonderfully dark charms off the manor. So," Pansy grinned liked a martyr. "I guess you'll be takin' sweet-cheeks out to play with the daisies bright n' breezy tomorrow, eh? Well, have a nice night, Draco Malfoy." She gave him a little finger-waggling wave and strolled leisurely out of the room. 


	14. The Silk That Binds Us / Poppies

Hermione awoke to see Draco's rain blue eyes looking at her intently.  
"Decided you're actually human yet?" She stretched her sore limbs and looked up at him.  
"Can I tempt you with some marzipan?" His hands were awkwardly holding a small glass dish.  
"Hmmm. Let me see...let's try, NO."  
Hermione found her hands bound magically with black silk. Her eyes were also covered with the soft material, and she could no longer see anything but darkness.  
"Sorry, I had to." Draco's voice didn't seem very sorry. It seemed heavy with a sense of duty. But why would he need to do this? Because he's going to kill you stupid! screamed the little voice in the back of Hermione's mind. He's played his little twisted games with you and now he's going to dispose of you.  
Then suddenly, almost impulsively, Draco's soft lips found her's. In the snow-flake-like kiss Hermione could sense pure deep emotion. It ran through their veins like undiluted cherry cordial. But, she then remembered that her life was going to be taken moments away from this toffee-coated kiss with him.  
Not like this, the voice in her mind was now saying. Life can't end like this...not when perfection has been found at last amongst chaos. Not when everything so wrong feels so right.  
He pulled away, and gently tugged on the ties around her wrists.  
"Come on then."  
Hermione was furious, half longing madly for the kiss that had ended so suddenly.  
"I'm not a damn trained monkey! Why are you so...so..." She lost her words, and instead, sobbed quietly behind the blindfold.  
Draco longed to wrap his arms around her and stop the tears from streaming down her face. He gently wiped a tear that hung on her left cheek.  
"Because I realise you were right. I don't hate you...I lo-" He paused. "No, not here. Just come with me. Imperio." The curse was whispered, and Hermione, like a puppet on invisible strings, had no choice but to follow him.  
*  
The poppy field lay beyond the woods. Red, pink and orange poppies filled the air with a nauseatingly saccharine smell, which, if inhaled for too long, made your head spin. Hermione thought she must have looked rather stupid, walking along blindly behind Draco. Of course, the spell on her made sure she didn't crash into any walls...but since he was the one in control, her next step could very well lead her off the edge of a cliff. When they reached the field, Hermione felt her head spin with the scent of the flowers. The tart sweetness smothered her lungs, and she somehow felt sleepy and edgy at the same time. Draco suddenly let go of her wrists and instead pulled her in to embrace her.  
"Hermione..." He whispered, his breath tickling her ear. His lips gently placed a zephyr-light kiss on her lips. A startling contrast was made to the tender emotion in his kiss when Hermione felt the wintry sensation of something metal against her wrist. Hermione felt strangely empty, like death itself had dragged her, an Alice in Wonderland of sorts, down some sort of flipped out rabbit hole. A lone tear trailed slowly down her cheek. Draco was always singing half-insane. Well, if she was going to die...might as well play his game one last time.  
"Somewhere over the rainbow...way up high...there's a land that I've heard of, once in a lullaby..." Her voice was barely there, almost a whisper in the syrupy breeze.  
"Oh shut up woman." He silenced her with another surprisingly gentle kiss.  
Hermione sucked in a frightened breath and choked back a sob. The metal was back against her skin.  
Her final moment had come. 


	15. The Stars Tilt and Tumble / Suddenly Fal...

Hermione squeezed her eyes shut, waiting for the sharp pain of the knife slashing her flesh. It never came.  
Instead, she felt the silk around her wrists slip off, freeing her. Gentle hands undid the blindfold from around her eyes. The bright sunlight suddenly hit her eyes, forcing her to blink rapidly. Draco sighed heavily, a hand still on her cheek.  
"You're free to go."  
Hermione pulled away and looked up at him, silent...her expression unreadable.  
"What? Didn't you hear me? I said you're free. Go." He gestured wildly out beyond where they were standing.  
"I'm not going." Hermione looked down at her feet, before glancing up at him again. "I'm not leaving."  
"Look you have to," His tone was pleading, and it only furthered Hermione's confusion. "Please...just run...run far away from here, and don't ever return to look for me. Forget this place and everything that's happened and everything that's been."  
"If I left, I would never forgive myself for everything that could have been. I would regret the things that would never again have a chance."  
Draco's eyes clouded with mild bewilderment.  
"Before anything else Hermione, I just want to tell you something. What I was going to say back in the manor is..." He paused, a thoughtful expression briefly appearing on his face. "You're the only one who has ever bothered to see beyond this whole masquerade...this endless deceit. I'm a bad, bad person...if I even deserve to be classified as a person. But you somehow saw past everything into something much deeper. You were right, I've run away from emotion...thinking that insensibility was a safer way of existing than consciousness." His voice shook slightly. "I don't hate you. Infact, every time I touch you everything else around me seems to crumble. I tell myself over and over you're a weak and worthless mudblood. But in the end...I can't lie to my heart." Hermione's heart soared at his poetic confessions. "I love you." At this Hermione's stomach did a swift flip-flop and the tiny voice in her head let out a little scream that could have been a silent whoop of joy or a shocked cry.  
"But I hate myself for loving you." Ashamed, Draco turned his face towards the sun and breathed in a trembling breath.  
"Don't." Hermione whispered. "You can't hate yourself...because I love you. And I have always, loved you."  
Draco stared at her, uncertain. He swallowed hard.  
"My heart...soars to hear that, Hermione. I thought you would hate me. After all, why would you ever love a monster? Loving you is all there is...but you must go." He briskly and expertly wiped a lone tear. "It is imperative that you leave at once."  
"I'm not going, because I'll always be here with you. I love you, and that means I will be here by your side no matter what. There is no world for me apart from here. My family are dead...everyone I love is probably dead. Everyone that is, apart from you."  
A wry grin settled on his lips.  
"Woman, I'm the Dark Lord. Slaying, blood, murder galore! Oh, fun for all the family! The wonderfulness of being a Malfoy-" (the name was said with much antipathy) "-has brought me to such great things in life. I beat Voldemort. I took his position...and for what? I still feel empty. I have little power trips and I kill kill kill-" His eyes filled with a strange fire. "-but in the end I come crashing down, feeling less than empty. I can't feel, I can't breathe without suffocating in darkness, I can't love...I can't even allow myself to cry like anyone else." He seemed lost for a moment.  
"Then let me cry for you."  
Hermione captured Draco's lips in a soft kiss that tasted of almonds and champagne. All caution and previous rational thoughts were swept into the periwinkle sky, as Draco gave himself up to the kiss.  
His tears melted into her's as they lost themselves from the world that surrounded them.  
"Now there's only one problem..." Draco murmured almost sleepily.  
"What?"  
"Us. You. Me. Everything."  
"What will the world think when it finds out? Surely everyone will-"  
"Let the world think whatever it bloody well wants to think. All that matters is that you are in my arms and I have found love amongst tears. I am your's. But...are you afraid?"  
Confusion was evident in Hermione's eyes as they met Draco's ones of fire and ice.  
"Of what?"  
"I am the Dark Lord. You are an angel."  
Hermione let out a gentle laugh that tinkled like snow bells.  
"I'm not afraid...because I know you would never hurt me...you never could. And I am no angel."  
"To my heart you are."  
"You're just going to make me cry even more aren't you?"   
"Well that will never do will it? We'll have to make it all better." Draco gathered Hermione's thin frame in his arms and kissed the tears away.  
*****  
a/n  
Fluffiness was not planned. I thought I could stray from the path of eternal fluffiness. I thought wrong.  
Christy : You read my mind! I came back online a few days after writing this chapter...and your prophetic review was very similar to how I had written it. Although, Hermione didn't leave at all.  
Sigh. Fluff galore. I will try to make the next chapter much more drama based not fluffy...unless that's how you want it, I guess.  
Thankyou for all your amazing reviews! I honestly had no idea that this many people would like the story, and it's really very flattering.  
P.S.-- I am sort of thinking of writing a Draco+Harry story, depending on how inspired I am to do so.  
P.S.S-- Epequa, I read your story, and it's very good. Keep up the good work! 


	16. Scarred Yet No Longer Scared / To Be Lov...

"We are stuffed...totally stu-uffed..." Hermione walked around her new room throwing pillows at walls, singing loudly. What was the use of keeping quiet? Draco had gone to tell Pansy...what? She didn't exactly know the details of what he had gone to do or say. Hermione only hoped that Draco didn't kill her. She also knew that this was probably what he would do. Even if the pug-faced bitchy little sicko did want her killed in the first place, Hermione didn't want to wish death upon her. After all, it was Christmas. She'd only realised this after they had come in from the poppy fields. The castle, black and neo-roccoco gothic as it was, was covered in blooms of berry-red holly and curls of green ivy. A light snow had begun to fall on their journey back, sending down drifts of silver frost flakes.  
The door opened silently, but Hermione didn't need the squeak of ancient door hinges or a creak of wood to be aware of his presence.  
"Draco..." She called out his name freely, savouring the sound of it and all that it meant to her as it rolled off her tongue.  
His arm snaked around her slender waist, his lips gently kissing her neck.  
"I've...dealt with her."  
"Good..." Hermione murmured as Draco's hands began to massage her shoulders.  
"Don't you want to know how?"  
"If you killed her, I'd rather not have the specific details. Incase you didn't notice, I don't particularly glorify in murder and mayhem." She turned around and narrowed her eyes at him. She was speaking the truth. The one thing that gnawed away at her conscience about this was the fact that it was him and not some auror or ministry man. All the bloods and guts involved in his life could start to seriously take its toll on her already slightly-frayed sanity. But, she did not have any doubts of what name was engraved in her heart.  
"Oh...I didn't kill her." He grinned slyly. "After all...humiliation is far worse than death." A wave of his wand revealed an image of Pansy slaving away in the kitchens amongst the house elves. "One lifetime as a Malfoy has taught me that." The grin faded and gave way to some semblance of remorse.  
Hermione decided against questioning him on the topic for the time being. It was obviously wounds from his tormented past. Instead, she layed her head on his shoulder, her hands clutching his.  
"Every breath Hermione, I wonder why you...you even chose to stay. But if this is destiny, I am glad..." He sighed. "I'm sorry that I'm not everything you deserve. I'm sorry I can't be someone else, someone better than who I am. I would change if I could...become a sensitive new age wizard. Okay," He grinned with a boyish cheekiness that was so rare to him. "Maybe I wouldn't go that far. But I would do anything for you, you know that right? I tried so hard in Hogwarts to defy everything that was what it was. But it ran through my veins like poison." He shook his head. "I'm like that damn muggle - King Midas. Everything I touch is tarnished forever."  
"Shhh..." Hermione shook her head, silently urging him not to continue with his melancholic condolences for not being a better person. He had always been...well, Draco Malfoy. And he probably always would be Draco Malfoy. No reason to beat around the sodding bush and deny it. Denying thy father and refusing thy name, as Shakespeare put it, couldn't and wouldn't ever change anything for him. Denying thy father, for Draco, seemed to have meant a result of getting beaten up or hurt in some way.  
But it was Draco Malfoy she had fallen head over heels and tumbled skyward for. Not some big world-saving hero(a memory of a dark-haired, emerald-eyed boy ran through her mind), or some well-meaning, surely-in-denial but seriously-obsessed friend(no need to mention a particular male Weasley)...but Draco Malfoy. Glacial, brittle, darkly alluring creature that possessed an undeniable splendour in himself. Hermione could not imagine him any other way.  
She lifted Draco's hand slightly, and gently pulled away the dark sleeves of his robes, revealing the Dark Mark that had been stamped there before he had become master over everything in the shadows of night. Hermione brought his arm up towards her, her eyes still gazing at the mark. Through lowered eyelashes she looked up at him with almost childlike innocence, and softly kissed the mark on the smooth flesh of his wrist. The moment seemed to hang, suspended in a crystal bauble in time. Everything seemed surreal...the crackle of the fire, to the pale scarred skin beneath rose pink lips.  
"Your scars don't make you who you are Draco. Had it not been for all that has been in our lives, we probably would not be in this moment."  
The door suddenly swung open, and a familiar tall dark form strode in, not caring or not noticing how in-the-moment the other two people were. Draco was beside himself with annoyance, and he glared at Snape, his eyes flashing dangerously at the older man.  
"Gods Snape, can't the Dark Lord even get a private moment alone?!"  
Snape ducked to the side as a heavy metal bookend went flying past his head. He was about to make some sour Snape-ish comment when a familiar face popped up in the fire place, causing Hermione to gasp in shock, and Draco to chuckle softly at her sudden surprise. That was, until, he heard the news his loyal servant had to give him from within the crackling flames. Afterwards, he paled ever more slightly, and gripped Hermione's shoulder tightly as if to keep himself from feeling quite ill.  
***  
a/n:  
part of the title('to be loved in return') is from the song "nature boy". 


	17. Standing Proud / Crashing Into Comets

"Ginny?!" Hermione gaped at the red-haired head of the girl in the fire, who was currently facing them with a stony grim expression on her pale round face.  
"Surprised, 'Mione? I'll explain it all later, really, I promise. Lord Draco," Ginny's face turned towards Draco.  
"Yes?"  
"Pansy Parkinson has escaped from the manor."  
Hermione let out a shocked cry, wondering at the horrible consequences which would result from this. Her initial surprise at seeing Ginny serving the new Dark Lord had given way to a new fear that settled in her stomach like acid. Draco's face was hard with a strange coldness, yet for a split second, he lost his composure, and bit down gently on his bottom lip.  
"How? I placed a spell on the manor ensuring she could not owl anyone and that she would not have been able to apparate anywhere beyond the walls of the manor."  
"It seems she escaped through a passage that runs beneath the lake.." Draco cursed loudly at himself for having forgotten the secret passage that ran from the corner dungeon out beyond the frosted hills. Pansy must have merely cast a charm that ensured an image of her working in the kitchens would appear when Draco summoned it. "She is currently with the ministry. My lord, they are preparing to launch a full scale attack on you by the next full moon. Your spells to prevent Pansy Parkinson from apparating out of the manor also prevents anyone from apparating in. The ministry plans to approach the manor through non-magical methods. Potter is bringing a 1000-wizard strong force."  
"Has anyone blocked off the tunnel that...that insolent troll used to escape?"  
Ginny nodded briskly, her red hair bobbing up and down.  
"Yes my Lord. But Parkinson has told them all the ways of taking the other protective spells off the manor. My suggestion is..." Ginny paused, as if she were not quite sure whether to continue. "My suggestion is that you leave at once. Take Hermione with you, and by Merlin...don't let any harm come to her."  
"I would die before I let anyone lay a finger on her...I know she and you were friends, and I assure you, she will be safe with me." Draco turned slightly and wrapped a protective arm around Hermione. "But I will not run. Let little Scar-face and his people just TRY and ruin our Christmas. After all, whoever said you had to be good to celebrate? Santa never dared to bring me a lump of coal, even after all my doings."  
"My Lord...what will you do?" Ginny's expression revealed how apprehensive she was about the whole situation. "There is nothing left to do but run...Potter's army is anything but little..."  
"Enough!" Draco yelled, almost with a mad fire burning in his eyes. "Enough running, enough hiding! Even as the Dark Lord...am I to fear Potter? Voldemort may have been foolish enough to be a weakling in front of Potter - but I am not Voldemort! I will not blow in Potter's sodding breeze like a sodding daffodil!"  
"Draco..." Hermione started, gently laying a hand on his arm.  
"I may not have a soul Hermione...but I know I love you. And I also know this." His eyes met hers. "I will protect you until my dying breath. But I am NOT. running. away. from. HIM!"  
"So what WILL you do?" Snape's voice was barely audible, but it filled the room like silken water. All eyes turned to the dark form of Snape looming in the shadows. "Will you confront him? If this is your plan, then...I am at your service until my final moment." Snape bowed before Draco, showing his true devotion to his former student.  
"Severus, you are to be commended for all that you have done for me. You have proven to be a true comrade, and I thank you for everything. It is also to you that I owe my love's life." Hermione felt a warm tear slide down her face. "But I wish to talk to Hermione alone." Ginny nodded, and her head vanished from the flames. Snape inclined his head slightly, and strode out of the room like a dark cloud.  
"Hermione...perhaps it would be best if you left here. I will ask Snape to take you far away, where you will be safe. I trust Snape with my life, and he will make sure you are out of harm's way. Staying here would put you in serious danger"  
"I'm not going to avoid the obvious Draco. I understand that death is the biggest possibility. But by your side, I have no reason to be afraid of anything that may come. I've chosen my destiny...and it's with you I belong. I told you once, and I will tell you again - there is no world, without you. But I am curious as to what exactly we are planning to do. Lo and behold, ho, death comes! But what do you have up your sleeves?"  
"A bunny rabbit? I laugh death in the face!" He laughed, but it was a hollow, artificial sound. Draco bravely put on a grin and puffed out his chest, although he actually felt the snake-like grip of fear tightening around his lungs and squeezing air out of them. "Fear not Hermione. I shall summon my loyal followers, and we will celebrate and be merry. We will dress in our best, and face the enemy like gentlemen, while revelling in our victory over the bending will of time. Our victory...is eternal."  
Hermione knew he did not mean the victory of dark over light. No, he meant something much deeper inside themselves, something that could not have been defined by good and bad or black and white.  
"With a braveness and a faith in undying love like that you would have made a great Gryffindor." A soft whisper and an even softer touch of her hand against his pale cold cheek. "Perhaps...perhaps then..." Her voice trailed away, unable to continue.  
"But the cowardice in my heart and the sins of my condemned soul would have put me to shame." He placed his hand over hers. "At least I had a soul back then. Now all I have is you."  
"And you will have me forever."  
Like a young child, he gave way to absolute helpless emotion, and sought refuge in Hermione's comforting embrace.  
"Draco...it will be all right. Shhh..." His warm tears soaked the shoulder of her grey robes as he bawled almost helplessly. Hermione wasn't shocked. But she was, however, just as afraid of their uncertain future that lay ahead of them.  
***  
a/n: Gosh, another cliff-hanger. Me sorries :( -twists ears in a true Dobby style- lol Happy New Year every1! I have read your fics and they're great :D -claps- way2go peoplez:)  
Once again, thank.u so much 4 all your reviews: they just make my day...wait, year! n.e.wayz...u.all rock!  
PS: Slytherin Goddess, I have tried to make darling Sevi nicer. Well...um...loyal n.e.way, hehe :D  
PSS: LilyAyl, your stories are so beautiful!...a perfect sunrise is so pretty, yet so sad -sniffle-, and Music Of The Night is very original and intriguing! Wonderful stuff!  
PSSS: Xaviera - awww, what can I say girl? Gorgeous, angsty, sad...awwwwww. Great job!  
PSSSS: How can n.e.1 out there NOT like Sad!Draco ??? Poor thing... 


	18. Children Of The Revolution

"My friends," Draco spread his arms open in a grand gesture, his face solemn. "My friends we have gathered together...to celebrate!" A roar went up from the crowd, most of them eagerly cheering and clapping for their Lord and master, some slightly tense and nervous. Ginny nervously wrung her hands together, but she too joined in the applause.  
"Now you may have heard of the plans of that idiot with his, dare-I-say-it, VOLDEMORT given scar - "A few people chuckled. "- But I do not think any of you will be foolish enough to believe the ludicrous rumours. Potter will never win...I, Draco, Your devoted lord, will conquer that fool's childish dreams of being the best!" It was no longer really a school-days rivalry between two boys, but a battle between titles and loyalties. "My loyal followers...tonight shall be our night of glory!" Hermione would have found his imitation of valour quite hilarious at one stage. All that flourishing of grand arm movements and those proud statements of his own greatness. But things had changed immensely. Now his actions acted in only increasing her fear for him. There might have been several hundreds of Draco's followers here, but they would never be enough to defeat Harry and his own army of wizards. And she still had no idea what he had in mind to finish this all off. The drinks and fine foods would act as a cover for the real fear and anxiety that lingered in all their hearts for only so long. Soon, as early as sunrise the next morning, they would have to face the truth. Something would happen. Something had to, and was bound to. There was a feeling that everything was already planned on some cosmic level, and that nothing could be done to change whatever fate had in store for them. Hermione placed an arm around Draco and stepped closer to him. Draco gently rested his chin on the top of her head.  
"What shall we do Hermione?"  
"Our ultimatums will come soon enough . But until then...we'll party, won't we? If this is the last bash, might as well make it the best!" She raised her almost empty champagne glass and clinked it against his own. Her actions seemed half out of place, and just as plastic as Draco's words. The room itself and the scene before...everything was artificial, as if it had all been cut out of cardboard and stuck on a piece of paper. Bits and pieces of paper collage thrown together to make some sort of sense. A foreboding cloud that hung above all their heads was deliberately ignored as they drowned their uncertainties in alcohol.  
A slow hypnotic waltz and the tinklings of a piano echoed through the manor, magically amplified. Draco pulled Hermione in a slow circle and wrapped his arms around her, swaying slowly to the music.  
"People might be watching...Slytherin." She grinned up at him.  
"They can all sod off and mind their own business...Gryffindor." He chuckled.  
Suddenly Hermione started crying softly, burying her face in the soft thick material of his highly expensive black dress robes. Her hands tightly gripped the lapels of his robes.  
"Draco...I don't want to leave this moment. Ever."  
He had no words in return for her, only a burning in his heart so intense, it made the past seem like a hazy nightmare.  
Sure, he hated everything. Gods, he even hated himself. The years of abuse and suffering under Lucius Malfoy and Voldemort...the further trouble at Hogwarts. Of course, he hated Harry Potter. Harry Potter had things he could only dream of, like true friends. God forbid, he had even hated Hermione Granger, once(it seemed like forever ago). She was so smart, so witty. Her and that Potter along with the Weasel...they rode the wave of popularity like a sodding tide at the beach. But hate was a step away from love. He didn't dare plunge into THAT abyss while at that damn school, but it had haunted him. He had wanted control and power in his life. He'd never wanted to really be such a killer. But after years of not being allowed to feel anything but hate, he'd turned that hate into a lust to be a figure of authority, of dominance. Thus year by year, until now, nine years after Hogwarts, he had come to be exactly where he was, surrounded by people that adored him and followed his every word, yet only really caring about one of them...the one he was dancing with.  
As the song ended, Draco and Hermione gently pulled apart from each other.  
"Mione, can I talk to you?" Ginny, in robes of a splendid deep blue, walked up to them, and smiled at Hermione, who hastily wiped her damp cheeks.  
"Unless you object of course, my Lord." Ginny turned to Draco.  
"No no...go ahead. Secret Girl's business is something the Dark Lord can't interfere with." A smile played on his lips, and he waved at Hermione.  
"Go."  
"Draco-"  
"I'll see you later Hermione. Now go woman!"  
Hermione and Ginny walked off.  
"Hermione-" Ginny started, at the same time that Hermione said her name. Ginny laughed.  
"I think I'd better explain everything."  
"Yes, I think you should."  
"Perhaps...perhaps you're wondering how I ended up here. Ickle Ronnie's little sister..."  
Hermione nodded and blushed.  
"Yes Ginny, I did wonder. I never knew..."  
"And I never really knew...well, I heard that you were kidnapped from your office at the  
ministry, but I never dreamed that this is where it would all end up. But do you want to know why I am  
where I am?" Ginny rolled her glass between her hands, and continued without waiting for Hermione to answer. "Because it offered me some sort of role in life. Instead of being the weak, pathetic little tag-along, for once I felt like an actual somebody..."  
"I understand." Hermione put a hand on Ginny's arm.  
*  
Towards the end of the evening, Draco stood again at his little podium.  
"Adieu, adieu my friends! Parting is such sweet sorrow. But fear not! For the brave do not really die. And so I bid you a most wonderful goodnight, and farewell." Draco turned and took Hermione's hand in his. No-one fully understood why he was saying farewell. But they wondered, perhaps it was because he was drunk. Goyle, big and dumb as he had always been, turned to Crabbe beside him.  
"I thought he said he wasn't going to run?"  
"I don't think he intends to." Muttered a pensive Snape standing nearby, almost to himself.  
***  
a/n:  
Sorry for not e-owling straight away with the updates(will try to as soon as stoopid email works again!) The chapter title comes from the song with the same name. 


	19. Silver White Melting Into Nothingness / ...

In a silent room upstairs, away from the prying eyes of his supporters, Draco sat beside Hermione, ready to perform a binding spell more sacred than just a marriage, more everlasting beyond death. The fire crackled, intensifying the atmosphere of the room.  
"Hermione, this may hurt a little...you do understand that, right? This particular binding spell may sting slightly." Hermione nodded, her heart pounding furiously like a bass drum, as Draco produced a small bottle from within the folds of his heavy black cloak. Opening the stopper, he poured a strange ice-cold substance on to her fingers. It looked like mercury, but it gave off a smell of heavy rose petals and newly made steel. Next, he placed his own hand on hers, and muttered a few foreign words in a low whisper. Hermione let out a small cry of fear as the cold began twisting and forming strange patterns along her fingers. As she watched with slight pain and wonderment, the now solidifying metal formed the shape of a dragon along on of her fingers. It twisted over Draco's own pale slender finger and formed the exact same shape. With a frosty snap, the metal cracked into two seperate rings. The sting turned into a strange burning of cold fire, and Hermione had to clench her jaw to keep from crying out. The metal finally ceased all movement, and it appeared to almost melt into her flesh and become imbedded in her skin. Hermione cautiously ran her thumb along the area. Just as she had half-expected, the metal was now strangely grafted into the skin of her finger. It was death-cold, and she quickly drew her thumb back.  
"Now the final thing to complete the ritual to bind us, my love. You may want to turn away for this next part." Even Draco's voice sounded quavery. Instead of turning away, Hermione was only more anxious with excitement tinged with fear to see what the next part was. After a few more strange intoxicating words from Draco, the metal became fiery hot, and it started to move again. Hermione watched curiously with pain flickering in her eyes as it contorted and writhed. The dragon's head lifted off her finger, and turned slightly, opening its mouth. Hermione bit down on her bottom lip hard as the dragon's metal teeth punctured her skin, drawing a crimson droplet of blood. Suddenly the room began to swim in front of her eyes as if bizarre drugs had just been pumped through her veins. Even as she struggled to stay awake, she felt her eyelids slowly giving way.  
"Shhhh...it's all over. Don't worry...I love you, Hermione." A hand gently took her own, a warm voice softly lulling her to sleep, wrapped in the soothing words of a lullaby.  
As the sandman began to take hold, she heard someone, or rather, several someones, burst through the door. A deep voice, stricken with a fear and panic unusual to its owner...  
"My Lord...Potter, and his army...they're coming. Now."  
"I know, Severus..."  
"How? Oh don't bother explaining Draco. But there is nothing we can do. At the most we have forty-five minutes, an hour."  
"Hermione!" Her name was called out by a younger girl, and a blur of red hair and velvet robes rushed to her side.  
"She will be fine...A binding spell has been performed on her. Ginny, Severus...take her downstairs. I will be down shortly."  
"Master-"  
"Be quiet!" An irritated voice snapped. Hermione was finding it increasingly harder to match up voices and names.  
"Shut up...all of you! Do. What. I. Said! Take Hermione and leave me. LEAVE ME!" A sound of something shattering filled the otherwise empty silence. A half-insane laugh followed. Hermione felt someone slowly pick her up. Her head felt as light as if it were filled with helium, and blood pounded through her veins like a rushing torrent. The blur of colours around her soon became a blur of grey, that in turn faded out to a blackness of nothing. 


	20. Velvet Curtain

Hermione awoke to find herself lying on a black crushed velvet lounge. She sat up briskly, her eyes darting around wildly like a frightened deer caught in the head lights of an on-coming muggle car.  
"Where is he?"  
"Upstairs, my Lady." A short and slightly over-weight young man bowed in front of her.  
"How long have I been out? Why am I here and not with him?"  
"Calm yourself." Snape stepped forward and layed a reassuring hand on her shoulder. She shrugged out of his grasp and glared at him.  
"Stop telling me to bloody well calm down! What. The. HELL. Is. Going. ON!?"  
"Potter is coming." Snape reached into his robes. "Draco...he asked me to give you this. I did not open it, I realise it must be a personal letter for you." Snape handed her a small black envelope lined with a silver border. Hermione tore at it with her finger nails until it ripped and a folded piece of paper fell out. With a sharp intake of breath, Hermione eyes scanned the page.  
~  
My Precious Hermione,  
You showed me what it was to live and love. I love you, and I will always love you, more than you will ever know.  
Take my love into a world that I will never see.  
Forever more yours,  
Draco.  
~  
A tear fell from her misted over eyes and splashed on to the page, blurring the word 'live' in the first line. From this moment on, living would be something non-existent for Draco. Gripping the letter to her chest, Hermione dashed out of the room and up the dark stairs. She entered the room that contained Draco, and a vicious sob rose from within her. ***  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
His pale form lay crumpled on the floor, surrounded by a pool of his own dark red blood.  
"Draco - no." The whisper fell from her lips as she stood strangely transfixed to the spot, her eyes never leaving the body that lay before them on the floor.  
"He's dead!" Ginny, who had dashed up behind Hermione, held a hand up to her mouth, her eyes wide open dramatically with horror.  
"Oh for Merlin's sake keep your wits about you, you foolish girl!" Snapped an irritated Snape. "How would the Dark Lord die so easily...and when we left him not ten minutes ago?"  
"By this..." Hermione knelt down beside Draco, and gently picked up his wand, its tip still glowing from the masses of self-inflicting curses he must have cast upon himself. Blood was splashed on it from the multitudes of deep cuts and gashes all over his pale lean frame. His clothes were ripped and torn and blood-drenched. The face was the only thing that did not give any tell-tale signs of what had happened. It remained almost ethereal in its beauty, framed by waves of platinum. Hermione gently stroked one pale cheek, a tear falling from her face on to his. She took his colourless hand in hers, tears streaming like little rivers of sadness.  
"Is he..." Ginny began, but was obviously not able to continue the question. Hermione shook her head.  
No, his pulse was there, but faint, as if it were a candle flame, slowly burning out. When Draco slowly opened his eyes, Hermione let out a gasp, shocked to see the eyes of ice and fire looking at her with so much emotion it filled the emptiness around them. Her heart ached with the realisation that this was probably the last time she would look at his eyes, twin windows of stormy weather.  
"Hermione..." Draco whispered, his voice distant, hardly there. It seemed that he was almost gone from the world, that this voice talking to her was actually that of a spirit, not a real person. Hermione gripped his hand tightly, refusing to let go.  
"Shhh...Draco, don't talk...you'll be fine. You'll be fine." She repeated, more determined. "You're the Dark Lord. Oh stuff that...I don't care what your title is. I love you, and hell will freeze over before I let anything come between us." For his sake, she tried to remain strong, tried not to show how very very afraid she was. His life was slipping from him like the waves from the shore, yet he smiled up at her, a hand reaching up to touch her smooth cheek.  
"A coward until the end, wasn't I? A ferrety obstinate coward that didn't want to die by someone else's hand. With me, dies our past. You're safe now. You're free." He struggled with the words, trying to hide how painful it was to move, to speak, yet failing.  
"Draco...you are not giving up!" Hermione felt a strange anger surge within her like a breaking wave.  
"You can't leave me! I didn't leave you...and you can't leave me." The words fell from her lips like trickles of rain before a storm...they soon dissolved into an uncontrollable sobbing. She wrapped her arms around Draco. With much effort, Draco raised his cold lips to her warm ones. His breath was strangely warm, as he whispered;  
"We'll always be together Hermione. I love you." He kissed her. "Thus, with a kiss..." Ironically enough, a muggle quote from Shakespeare. "I die..." His eyelids fluttered shut with a gentle softness like butterfly wings.  
Sudden loud, angry voices drew nearer, a rumble of heavy footsteps, and a few smashes and screams.  
They were here.  
"If anybody dares to come near him I'll rip them apart with my hands!" Hermione's eyes glared furiously towards the door shooting invisible daggers, as if challenging anyone to enter. "Nobody will touch him. Do you hear me? Nobody!"  
"They won't have to..." Snape's eyes met Hermione's, his voice sounding twisted with pain. "He is gone. I am sorry...Hermione" He turned his face away from the light of the fire, and a single tear trickled down the sallow skin of his face. He did not make a move to wipe it away.  
Hermione sank to her knees and cried, burying in head in her hands. Loud racking sobs, that made her body shake with emotion. He was dead. The word seemed hollow to her. It made her feel numb. It seemed an impossibility. He wasn't dead. Couldn't be.  
But he was.  
A strange peace had settled over his face...a peace within himself, and a peace with everything. It was as if he was oblivious to every evil, every corruption in the world. His lips setlled into a slight smile of innocence. The fire had died out, but silvery pale moonlight flooded in through a high window, casting a celestial spotlight over the dragon who learned to love, and the girl who lost her love to death's pale flag.  
He was gone.  
Hermione desperately wished until her heart ached that in a moment his eyelids would open gently along with those long silken eyelashes, and he would say something or do something. Anything that would show that he wasn't dead. A hand came down gently on Hermione's shoulder, a voice calmly talking to her.  
"...should come back. Everyone at the ministry wants to see you...now that this madman's dead."  
"He's not mad!" She cried, throwing her arms over the lifeless form of Draco as if to protect him. "He's not...leave us alone Harry!" Her arm swung out wildly to fend off Harry and anybody else who dared to step near them, her heart overcome by helpless grief.  
More wizards from the ministry entered the room, the body and capture count on the ground floor past the two-hundred mark. They all stopped and stared. Neither bad nor good were thought about, as they froze at the startling scene that lay in front of them, like characters from a pantomime.  
Ginny clung to Snape's dark robes, unable to speak or move...unable to do anything but let the hot tears slide down her face.  
Snape did not put on the masks of indifference. He too, had droplets clinging to his cheeks.  
But Hermione, who had found love and lost it...Hermione felt everything she had gained slip away from her again...trickle from her hands like grains of sand. The world blurred into greyness. Everything was grey these days. And why should colour tint our emotions...when emotions are something beyond distinction by reds and yellows.  
  
A moment, suspended in time.  
  
A timeless love that would never shift, never change and never die.  
  
The stars outside the castle trembled with sadness, and shed their tears of sorrow over the lovers.  
  
  
~A velvet curtain drapes over the scene, covering those who dared to love~  
  
  
*fin*  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
THANKYOU:  
Thankyou so much To every1 who has reviewed. You really really really make my day, and your ongoing support, encouragement, and wonderful comments are very much treasured and appreciated.  
A few comments from the Author-Who-Craves-Mint-Aeros:  
Sorry for making it so sad if you didn't want it sad. But I felt this was the best way to end it. There will be one last chapter(an epilogue)...and possibly a sequel(yes?)  
Just a few more footnotes:  
The spell thing was sort of like a sacred marriage thing, except for wizards - I made it up. Sorry for any confusions.  
Mariella: Sorry for doing it this way...I hope you understand. Thank.u. for your wonderful comment.  
Lilyayl: If you don't mind me asking - why did you think Draco was an idiot. we all know he can be obnoxious - in a cute way;), but...?  
To everyone who thought it was deep/intense/descriptive: Thanks...I try to make it that way. :)  
To the people who wanted me to write more: Well, there ya go!  
AND BASICALLY 2 EVERYONE WHO LIKES THE STORY: THANKYOU THANKYOU THANKYOU!!! 


	21. Epilogue: the silence that follows the c...

~Epilogue~  
  
A silence follows the cold of the night...a dawn will rise, and take away the pain...  
  
Loss is something that can not be illustrate through hollow words, only felt through a bleeding heart that cries in aching silence.  
A window can be broken, spilling forth secrets and loves, discovery and damage. Glass can be broken  
so easily.  
But a single moment of joy and fulfillment, though fleeting, can not be broken...it remains with the memories, forever imprinted like a beautiful silk print on a web of time.  
Rain turns the world grey...snow covers everything in a thick blanket of immaculate whiteness.  
  
Hermione stood in the midst of the falling snow flakes, eyes gazing upwards, as if waiting for a miracle. The snow was her friend. It made her cheeks tingly, and numb. With numb cheeks, she could pretend she wasn't crying. A tear froze on her cheek, suspended in time. She put her fingers up to it. It was like a diamond. A diamond of sorrow, that melted away at the touch of her hand. Does everything you value melt away eventually?  
You always kill the one you love. Wilde had said that. And you do...you twist the blade.  
Hermione didn't even really feel the glass slash against her skin. Didn't feel anything. She only saw the ruby red blood drip on to the pure white of the snow, staining it. Red dissolved to pink...  
Her head started to spin. Hermione smiled, watching the stars dance before her eyes, blurring with the snowy landscape that surrounded her. A dark form came up behind her. Half-delusional, Hermione cried out in fear. But she needn't fear. It was only Snape, shoulders drooped, expression almost as emotionally exhausted as hers. Snape pressed material tightly to the wounds at her wrists, and spoke calmly to her.  
"You have to live Hermione. For him." Another layer of bandages.  
"There is no life without him." She tried to shrug her wrist out of his grasp, but found herself too weak to do so.  
"Hermione he will always be with you. I sincerely mean that, it's not just some romantic garble those muggles came up with in their movies. He WILL be with you, and he would want you to live...to go on and do wonderful things."  
"I can't without him..." Hermione found herself crumpling to her knees like a puppet with cut strings.  
The tears though, were strangely cleansing. They purged the sadness in her own soul as she wept for The Boy-Who-Wouldn't-Live. Perhaps in some alternate reality...perhaps. He might have lived. Things might have been different. Perhaps right now in a parallel dimension, they were both living a happily-ever-after ending. But not in this realm. Not where the snow was suddenly bleak and crisp around her, Snape's hand reasurring on her shoulder, almost fatherly, and the dawn breaking over the white-ice hills.  
The sun never stops rising. She'd eventually learn to move on...eventually.  
Of course, nothing would ever replace his sunshine-oxygen existence in her life. But from one horrible day to the next, she'd live. For him.  
  
*deuxieme fin*  
  
  
......  
  
  
  
~  
A fair slim boy not made for this world's pain,  
With hair of gold thick clustering round his ears,  
And longing eyes half veiled by foolish tears  
Like bluest water seen through mists of rain;  
Pale cheeks whereon no kiss hath left its stain,  
Red under-lip drawn in for fear of Love,  
And white throat whiter than the breast of dove -  
Alas! alas! if all should be in vain.  
~  
- from Oscar Wilde's 'Wasted Days'  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
After the final curtain has fallen...  
  
.....  
  
There was no way Hermione could or would have anything to do with the ministry any more. A few days after Draco's death and obstinately refusing to answer any questions about anything, Hermione officially quit her previous ministry job. She packed her bags and her belongings from the office and simply left without saying goodbye to anyone. It hurt too much to be surrounded by everything that linked her to the past. She resolved to living among the muggles in a small London apartment, not that far away from where her parents were buried.  
She worked part time in a muggle library. Sometimes, very rarely, after work she would go and visit The Leaky Couldron and Diagon Alley. Most of all though, she just wanted to forget about everything. Her attempts at writing a few books for the magical world was proving to be pointless...she just didn't have enough emotional energy or inspiration left to write. Living was proving to be excruciatingly difficult. Amongst the dusty library shelves, a day could seem like a year.  
Draco of course, was a memory that danced across her thoughts like wild fire every day and night. Try as she might, she couldn't surpress the burning ache in her heart every time she allowed her mind to drift to him.  
'The Dark Lord' seemed like an entirely different person to her Draco. It was someone only the ministry was really concerned about. But even to them, he was a closed book. Because now he was gone. Harry Potter moved on, and found other things to be a hero over. Ron Weasley was extremely disappointed. After all, he hadn't even had the chance to lay one finger on the much-hated 'pasty pathetic git'. But that had been The Dark Lord's plan...to not die at the will of someone else.  
Severus Snape disappeared from society and also from the ministry. Some say he moved to the muggle country side. Despite wanting to leave the past behind, a part of Hermione wished she could talk to Snape again. He was a link to Draco. Someone who had come close to seeing the boy beneath the ice.  
Ginny Weasley was never caught either. It was rumoured she escaped the ministry and travelled to America. Some say she died in a run-in with the wizarding law a few months later. Upon hearing the rumours, Hermione fiercely hoped the latter was just that...only a rumour.  
  
Sooner or later, Hermione realised, she'd have to let go of Draco Malfoy. Finally give him the peace he so very much deserved.  
The very fact that he was dead seemed to often mean nothing to her. It was just a word that could be looked up in a dictionary.  
Dreams often haunted her. She would wake up, and not fully recall the dream, or what had happened within it. But that was all they were. Empty dreams. For when someone dies, they can only exist in our memories and dreams. They don't live again. Do they...  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
THANKYOU:  
the readers and reviewers: every time i see your comments it makes me feel wonderful...peachy :)  
j.k. rowling: thankyou for creating the world of harry, draco, hogwarts and all those within the walls of your fantastic books  
mom + dad: thanks for putting up with my consistent, persistent, and often down right whiney babblings about my stories. thanks:)  
my friends: so i've seen harry potter how many times....? lol, thanks again for putting up with me guys, and thanks for the support  
  
A closing note:  
This epilogue was altered slightly. Hope you find this version a bit better:)  
A sequel is on its way. Hoepfully, it will be posted within the next few days. :)  
  
so finally:  
thankyou, and god bless  
*~ 


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